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IV.— FHE WORLD ASPECTS iW THE LOUISIANA PURCHASE 



By WILLIAM M. SLOANE, 
Professor, Columbia Universiti/, ycir york. 



85 



FEB 16 1905 
D. afB, 



THE WORLD ASPECTS OF THE LOUISIANA PURCHASE. 



By William M. Sloane. 



Argument by title is a very attractive form of fallacy. We 
therefore freely confess that it is rather a thesis we have to 
establish than a theme to unfold when we speak of the Louisi- 
ana purchase as a decisive epoch of general history and of 
American history in particular. Moreover, there is a sense 
in which every moment throughout the comparatively short 
duration of recorded history is a decisive one; in the pursuit 
of that idea the verge between soiuid, solemn truth, and fanci- 
ful fiction is but a razor edge. 

Yet by common consent some men and some events are 
epochal. Carefully scrutinized, such men and such events are 
known by very definite qualities. There are times when the 
great central current has few lagoons, no backwater, and 
never an eddy. The whole substance of history is thrown 
into a single channel, affording a nota})le example of the unity 
of history and compelling its study by transverse sections 
rather than b}' longitudinal fibers. The man of such a period 
is fairly certain to be preeminenth^ busy, so diligent, so com- 
prehensive, so perspicacious as to be for the duration of his 
activity and abilit}" an indispensable person, the man of his 
age. He is literally and etymologically a governor, for he 
steers the bark of state alike on the convexity of the swift 
and swollen tide, and in the hollowing current of a falling 
flood. 

Such a decisive epoch was that of the eig-hteenth-century 
revolutions, a crisis reached after long, slow preparation, pre- 
cipitated by social and religious bigotry, dizzy in its consum- 
mation, wild and headlong in its fiight, precipitous in its crash. 
Of this important time the results have been so permanent 
that they are the commonplaces of contemporary history; in 

87 



88 AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION. 

what Carlyle called the revolutionary loom the warp and woof 
were spun from the past, and the fabric is that from which 
our working clothes are cut. Moreover, within those years 
appeared the great dominating soul of modern humanity, who 
displayed first and last every weakness and every sordid mean- 
ness of mankind, but in such giant dimensions that even his 
depravity inspires awe. His virtues were equally porten- 
tious because they worked on the grand scale, with materials 
that had been thrashed and winnowed in the theory and 
experience of five generations of mankind. It was well within 
this stupendous age and by the act of this representative man 
that Louisiana was redeemed from Spanish misrule and incor- 
porated with;the Territories of the United States. Nor was 
this all. A careful examination of the general political situa- 
tion just a hundred years ago will exhibit the elemental and 
almost ultimate fact that the sale of Louisiana was coincident 
with the turn of the age. It is to this exhi])it and to some 
reflections on its meaning that we address ourselves. 

The substance of the treaty of Amiens was that Great 
Britain ostensibly abandoned all concern with the continent 
of Europe, and that France, ostensibly too, should strictl}' mind 
her own affairs in her colonies and the remoter quarters of the 
globe. George III removed from his escutcheon the fleur- 
de-lis, and from his ceremonial title the style of King of 
France. The whole negotiation was on both sides purel}^ 
diplomatic, an exchange of public and hollow courtesies, to 
gain time for the realities of a struggle for supremacy between 
the world powers of the period, a struggle begun with modern 
history, renewed in 1688, and destined to last until the 
exhaustion of one of the contestants in 1815. Neither party 
to the treaty had the slightest intention of observing either 
its spirit or its letter. While the paper was in process of 
negotiation Bonaparte was consolidating Fretich Empire on 
the Continent, and after its signature he did not pause for a 
single instant to show even a formal respect for his obliga- 
tions. The reorganization of Holland in preparation for its 
incorporation into the French system, the annexation of 
Piedmont, and defiance to Russia in the matter of her Italian 
proteges, the act of moderation in Switzerland, and, tinally, 
the contemptuous rearrangement of ( MM-many, were successive 
steps which reduced England to despair for her continental 



WORLD ASPP^CTS OF LOUISIANA PURCHASE. 89 

trade. To her it seemed as if there could be no question 
about two things: First, that the old order must be restored, 
in order to safeguard her commercial safety; and second, that 
her colonial policy must l)e more aggressive than ever. 

A favorite charge of Napoleon's detractors is that he left 
France without a colonial empire. This was due to no absence 
of eithei- aspirations or etiorts. His earliest passion, his 
mature intention, his latest yearnings were for a French 
colonial empire. This was true, because there was not one 
item of the great political creed formulated by Richelieu to 
which he did not consider himself the heir; oriental aspira- 
tions, western ventures and explorations, the dominance of 
France in the tropic seas, around the glol)e, were articles of 
that creed. It had been therefore no slight blow to his per- 
sonal ambition when he failed in Egypt. Turkey was still 
safe under the protection of Great Britain, and the highway 
to India was still in Bi'itish hands. Almost without a mo- 
ment's hesitancy, he turned his forces westward and formed 
the majestic design of a second New France around the Carib- 
bean, the Gulf of Mexico, and eventually with a might}^ wing 
toward South America. This adjunct became the chief corner 
stone of the policy when, after its initial failure, he had a 
chance to renew it in 1808 by Sassenay's mission to Argentina. 

Simultaneously he had come to terms wdth Paul of Russia, 
and with him he negotiated a grandiose treaty providing for 
a great land expedition against Hindustan. Each power was 
to furnish 85,000 men and a corps of scholars; the march was 
to ])e a colonization of the wilderness, and the wealth of the 
East Indies was to be the reward. Paul died by violence just 
as his army was crossing the Volga on the ice in March, 1801, 
and Alexander, his more or less blood-guilty but philosophic 
heir, put a stop to further procedure. A curious chapter of 
England's resistance to the French Revolution is that for 
which Lord Welleslc}" furnished the subject-matter in his 
campaign against Tippoo Sahil), then in alliance with a mighty 
band of French adventurers, who, though royalists, were 
willing to stand and tight for French supremac}^ in India. 
To this long and gallant struggle the treatj^ of Amiens was an 
extinguisher, for it restored the five French cities to Bonaparte. 
Decaen, the noted and boasting Aiiglophobe, nad demanded a 
mission to India on the verv morrow of Hohenlindeu; less 



90 AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASROCI ATION. 

tliiui a month after the si^Miaturcs wore aHixed at Ainiens he 
was dispatched to occiip}' the Freneli towns of Poiidicherrv. 
now to be restorinh But with an expedition of l,(i(»() men he 
iiad the monstrous dispr<)])ortion of seven <>en(>rals and a cor- 
responding;' mass of minor otKeers. Clearly he was to reor- 
ganize the whole French force of India. Wellesley refused 
to execute the treaty, and Decaen was forced Imck on the 
French settlements of Reunion as a ))ase from which to await 
developments. Hindu troops were drilled, reorganized, and 
t'oiuid thoroughly ti-ust worthy ; a detachment of them had (n^en 
been sent to Egypt, where they had some slight share in the 
retention. of British control. Jt was Bonaparte's role to pre- 
sent a dauntless front to his foes, whatever his inner discour- 
agement and hesitancy. Accordingly he dispatched the 
notorious Sebastiani as a so-called commercial agent to examine 
the situation in the Levant. The result was a report giving 
an exact account of all the P^nglisli and Turkish forces beyond 
the Adriatic, and drawing the highly pertinent conclusion 
that 6,000 French soldiers could reconquer Egypt. When 
this stinging insult was pul)lished by the First Consul in the 
Moniteur, the British world was worried into open defiance. 

From this rapid survey there emerge the important facts 
essential to our discussion. It was surely a turning point in 
the history of the civilized world, so far as Asia was con- 
cerned, when Bonaparte's oriental designs were permanently 
thwarted; when Russia was forced into an eastward expansion 
north of the great central mountain ridge of Asia to become 
a hyperborean power; when England detiantly claimed for the 
tirst time all Hindustan as her own. It wrote " tinis '' to the 
chapter of France's glory in India, and, indeed, to the story of 
her Asiatic aspirations; her far-eastern colonies seized under 
the present Republic are comparatively insigniticant; factories, 
which she holds on the sufferance of the European concert, 
and for which she w^ould not defy the world a single moment, 
as she would defy it to the spilling of her heart's blood should 
her present African empire l)e menaced. 

Again, the situation was a turning point of the first impor- 
tance in Africa. In consequence of the desire of ])oth con- 
tracting parties to catch their breath, Egypt ^\as restored to 
Turkey, and tfie Cape Colon}^ was to be a free port — a no- 
man's-land; Ahilta, which is an African isle, was to be returned 



WORLD ASPECTS OF LOrilSIANA PlTRCHASE. 91 

to the Knight's of St. John. The theoiy was that not one 
Christian power, continental or insular, was to hold a coign 
of vantage as regards the dark continent. Russia, to l)e sure, 
was ealous for Malta; England and France, for Egypt and 
the Cape; they might remain so, but that was all. Of course 
we are familiar with the late partitions of Africa among the 
powers, the coast and hinterland arrangements which bid fail' 
to become permanent occupations. Had it not been for the 
compulsor}' suspension of Bonaparte's oriental plans, the 
retention ])y England both of India and of the Indian highway 
through the Mediterranean, and the confirmation of this situ- 
ation by the evolution of affairs across the Atlantic, which 
culminated in the sale of Louisiana to us, the fate of Africa, 
humanl}' speaking, would, like that of Asia, have been far 
different in every sing'le respect. 

What was written for Europe in the book of fate was soon 
revealed. No one could prate more serenely about destiny 
than General Bonaparte, nor scrutinize more quizzically the 
sibjdline leaves. But like the augurs of old, he could scarcel}^ 
retain his mirth when he announced the oracle, nor keep his 
body from shaking with laughter while the feigned fury of 
passion was distorting the features of his face in frenzied 
anger. The treaty of Amiens was negotiated subject to guar- 
anties from the other powers, and Addington well knew that 
Russia was going to fish in the troubled waters of neutrality 
for the leviathan of her disappearing prosperity. So the 
English refused to evacuate Malta. The Whitworth scene is 
one of Napoleon Bonaparte's finest dramatic roles, and the 
delivery of his line, "I would rather see England in the 
Faubourg St. Antoine than in Malta," a climax of theatrical 
statesmanship. It is by no means sure that he might not have 
seen the British sail away both from Alexandria and Valetta; 
that he might not have received in delivery the cities of 
Pondicherry; that he might not have confirmed his American 
empire, had he been willing to grant Great Britain a com- 
mercial treat}^ that would have turned her stores of manufac- 
tured goods into hard cash, have relieved the awful financial 
strain under which she was tortured, and have given her the 
full advantage of her long precedence in the industrial revolu- 
tion. But no. By the treaty of Morfontaine, September 30, 
1800, with the United States, he arranged to strip us of all 



92 AMERTOAN HISTORTOAL ASSOCIATION. 

Mississippi tnidc :ukI tiius tardily execute the policy of our 
isolation on this continent, which Vergennes had vainly sought 
to embody in the pul^lic law of Europe. Soon he began to 
close the ports of France and her allies more firmly than ever 
to British goods, hoping under the protective system to give 
France a chance in the race for industrial supremacy. The 
English were aghast, and in their grim determination to renew 
what they felt was a struggle for life and death they broke off 
diplomatic relations, and war began. This outcome was 
inevitable, but it was too soon for Bonaparte. His versatility 
was sorely strained to settle finally on his policy. 

It was Samuel Adams who first sneered at his fatherland as 
a people of shopkeepers. The winged word soon became a 
commonplace to all outsiders, but as it flew every nation that 
used the gibe girded itself to enter the struggle for the same 
goal. France above all was determined to l)e a nation of 
shopkeepers, and the First Consul of what was still a shaky 
expei-iment in' govermuent knew well that rather than aban- 
don that ambition lie must sacrifice every other. After all, a 
colonial empire has value only as the home nation has acces- 
sible ports, manufactories for colonial products, and wares to 
exchange with the producers. France had neither factories 
nor manufactures, and was destitute of nearly the whole 
machinery of exchange. Her merchant vessels sailed only 
by grace of the British fleet. Her home market was depend- 
ent on British traders, even in times of war. Bonaparte's 
foremost thought, therefore, was for concentration of energy. 
The sea power of the world was Britain's, and her tyranny of 
the seas without a real check; even the United States could 
only spit out defiant and revengeful threats when her mer- 
chantmen were treated with contempt on the high seas by 
British men-of-war. Therefore with swift and comprehensive 
grasp he framed and announced a new policy. The French 
envoy in London was informed that France was now forced 
to the conquest of pAirope — this of course for the stimulating 
of French industries— and to the restoration of her occidental 
empire. This was most adroit. The embers of French patri- 
otism could be fanned into a white heat l)y these well worn 
but never exhausted expedients — a blast against perfidious 
Albion and a sentimental passion for the New France beyond 
the Atlantic. The motions were a feint against England bv 



WORLD ASPECTS OF LOUISIANA PURCHASE 93 

the formation of a second camp at Boulogne, where a force 
really destined for Austria was assembled, and the wresting 
of Louisiana from the weak Spanish hands which held it. As 
an incident of the agitation it seemed best that the French 
democracy should have an imperial rather than a republican 
title, and the stjde of emperor and empire was exhumed from 
the garbage heap of the Terror for use in the pageantry of a 
court. 

In Europe thus, as in the neighboring continents, the rear- 
rangement of politics, territorial boundaries, social, economic, 
and diplomatic relations, a change which has made possible 
the modern S3^stem, was really dependent on the events which 
led to the adoption of the policy just described. But this 
policy involved a reversal of every sound historical principle 
in Bonaparte's plans. For twelve years longer he was to 
commit blunder upon blunder; to trample on national pride; 
to elevate a false system of political economy into a fetish; to 
conduct, as in the Moscow campaign, great migrations to the 
eastward in defiance of nature's laws; to launch his plain, not 
to say vulgar and weak, family on an enterprise of monar- 
chical alliances for which they had no capacity; to undo, in 
short, as far as in him lay, every beneficent and well con- 
ceived piece of statesmanship with which he had so far been 
concerned. It has been well said that had he died in mid- 
summer, 1802, his glory would have been immaculate and 
there would have been no spots on his sun. The Napoleonic 
work in Europe was destined to have its far-reaching and 
permanent results, but the man was ere long almost entirely 
eliminated from control over them. The very last of his 
great constructions was the sale of Louisiana. He needed the 
purchase money, he selected his purchaser and forced it on 
him, with a view to upbuilding a giant rival to the gigantic 
power of Great Britain. 

When we turn, therefore, to America we shall at once 
observe on how slender a thread a great event may depend; 
how great a fire may be kindled by a spark adroitly placed. 
While yet other matters were hanging in the balance he 
selected his own brother-in-law. General Leclerc, such was 
his deep concern, to conduct an expedition to the West Indies. 
There were embarked 35,000 men, and these the very flower 
of the republican armies, superb fighters, but a possible thorn 



94 AMEKICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION. 

in the side of a budding enii)er<)r at iionie. Their goal was 
San Domingo, where a woiidertul negro, Toussaint L'Ouver- 
ture, noting the attractive example of the benevolent despots 
in pAirope, had, under republican forms, not only al)olished 
slaver}^, but had made himself a l)enelicent dictator. The 
fine but delicate structure of his negro state was easil}" crushed 
to the earth, but the fighting was fierce and pi'olonged, the 
climate and the pest were enal)led to inaugurate and complete 
a work of slaughter more ])aleful than that of war, and two- 
thirds of the French invaders, including the commander and 
15 of his generals, fell victims to the yellow fever. The 
French were utterly routed, the sorr}- remnants sailed away, 
and the blacks fell into the hands of the worthless tyrant 
Dessalines, whose misrule killed the germs of order planted 
by Toussaint. One of our historians thinks this check of 
France by ])lack soldiers to have been a determinative factor 
in American history, for thereafter there could be no question 
of a GuU and Caribbean empire for France. Louisiana, he 
indicates, ))ecame at once a superfluous dependency, costly 
and annoying. This is a far-fetched contention: Great as 
have been the services of the negro to the United States since 
he first fought on the ])attlefield of Monmouth under Wash- 
ington, the failure of France in San Domingo was not through 
the sword of the blacks, but was an act of God through 
pestilence. 

The circumstances that forced Louisiana upon the United 
States, then a petty power with revenues and expenditures 
far smaller than those of the Philppine Islands at this moment, 
arose from Napoleon's European necessities. The cession 
from Spain included all that Spain had received from France, 
the whole Gulf coast from St. Marys to the Rio Grande, and 
the French pretensions not only northwestward to the liockies 
but to the Pacific. The return made to Spain was the insig- 
nificant kingdom of Etruria and a solemn pledge that, should 
the First Consul fail in his promise, Louisiana in its fullest 
extent was to be restored to Spain. France therefore might 
not otherwise alienate it to au}^ power whatever. The exact- 
ing and suspicious spirit shown both 1)V Charles IV and his 
contemptible minister (iodoy. Prince^ of the Peace, had exas- 
perated Bona])arto l)(\vond endurance. The Spanish Bourlions 
were doomed b}' him to the fate of their kinsfolk in France; 



WORLD ASPECTS OF LOUISIANA rUKCHASE. 95 

a pledge to a vanishing phantom of ro^^alty was of .small 
account. It was during the delay created by the punctilio of 
Godoy that the failure of the San Domingo expedition extin- 
guished all hope of making Louisiana the sole entrepot and 
staple of supplies for the West Indies. And simultaneous!}- 
it grew evident that the truce negotiated at Amiens as a treat}^ 
could not last much longer; that either France must endure 
the humiliation of seeing her profits therefrom utterly with- 
held, or herself declare war, or goad Great Britain into a 
renewal of hostilities. This last, as is well known, was the 
alternative chosen b}^ Napoleon. 

Our Government had been in despair. The esta))li.shment 
of French empire in the West Indies would have destroyed 
our lucrative trade with the islands. It was trying enough 
that a feeble power like Spain should connnand the outlet of 
the Mississippi basin, but intolerable that such mastery of the 
continent shoidd fall into the hands of a strong and magisterial 
power like France. We were in dismay, even after the de- 
parture of the French from San Domingo. Bonaparte, how- 
ever, was scarcely less disturbed, for Jefferson, despite his 
avowed Gallicism, spirited!}^ declared both to the First Consul 
and to Livingston, our minister to Paris, that the occupation 
of Louisiana by the great French force organized to that end 
could only result in an alliance of the two English-speaking 
nations which would utterly banish the French flag from the 
high seas. Bonaparte preserved an outward calm for those 
about him and went his way apparently unperturl)ed. But 
inwardly his mind seethed and without long delay he took his 
choice between the courses open to him. It was the first 
exhibition to himself and his famil}^ of the imperial despot 
soon to be known as Napoleon I, Emperor of the French. If 
Britain was the tyrant of the seas, he would be despot of the 
land. To French empire he would reduce German} , Italy, 
and Spain in subjection, and with all the maritime resources 
of the continent at his back he would first shut every impor- 
tant port to English commerce, and then with allied and de- 
pendent fleets at his disposal, try conclusions with the British 
behemoth for liberty of the seas and a new colonial empire. 
By the second camp at Boulogne and the occupation of IIan-= 
over Napoleon threw England into jxmic, while sinndtaneously 
he began the creation of his grand imperial army and thereby 



96 AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION. 

menaced Austria, the greatest German power, in her coalition 
with Russia, Sweden, Naples, and Great Britain. The latter, 
he was well aware, could face a hostile demonstration on her 
front with courage-if not with equanimity, and he determined 
to add a double stroke — to gain a harvest of gold and on her 
rear to strengthen her exasperated trans-Atlantic sea ri\'al by 
selling Louisiana to the l-nited States. 

That determination was the turning point in his career, just 
as the sudden wheel and about face of the splendid force at 
Boulogne, when he hurled it across Europe at Vienna, dis- 
played at last the turning point in his policy. His l)rother 
Lucien had been an influential negotiator with Spain and 
plumed himself on the acquisition of the great domain which 
had been for long the brightest jewel in the crown of France. 
His brother Joseph had negotiated the ti'eaty of Amiens as a 
step preparatory to regaining a magnihcent colonial empire 
for his country, an empire of which an old and splendid 
French possession was to be the corner stone. Both were 
stunned and then exasperated when they learned their brother's 
resolution, sensations which were intensified to fury when 
they heard him announce that he would work his will in spite 
of all constitutional checks and balances. There is no historic 
scene more grotesque than that depicted by Lucien in his 
memoirs when he and Joseph imdertook to oppose Napoleon. 
The latter was luxuriating in his morning ))ath, on April T, 
1803, in the Tuileries, when the brothers were admitted. 
After a long and intimate talk on general politics the fateful 
subject w^as linall}' broached by Napoleon, as he turned from 
side to side and wallowed in the perfumed water. Neither of 
the brothers could control his feelings, and the controversy 
grew hot and furious from minute to minute until Joseph, 
leaning over the tub, roared threats of opposition and words 
of denunciation. Brother Napoleon, lifting himself half way 
to the top, suddenly fell back and clinched his arguments b}' 
splashing a full flood in the face and over the body of Joseph, 
drenching him to the skin. A valet was summoned. He 
entered, and paralyzed by the fury of the scene, fell in a dead 
faint. New aid was called, and the fires of passion l)eing slaked 
for the time, the conflict ended until Napoleon and Joseph were 
decentl}^ clothed, when it was renewed in the oflBce of the 
secretary Bourrienne. Ere long hot words were again spoken, 
violent language Avas succeeded by violent gestures, until at. 



WOELD ASPECTS OF LOUISIAIN A PURCHASE. 97 

last Napoleon in a theatrical rag-e dashed his snufl'l)ox on the 
floor and the contestants separated. Disjointed and fierce as, 
was the stormy argument, it revealed the whole of the impe- 
rial polic}" as we have stated it. 

Meanwhile events in America, if not so picturesque and 
majestic, were equall}^ tempestuous. The peace policy of 
Jefl'erson was rapidly going to pieces in the face of a west- 
ward menace, the Federalists were jubilant, and in the Senate 
James Ross, of Pennsylvania, called for war. When the 
intendant of Spain at New Orleans denied Americans the 
storage rights they had enjoyed in that city since 1795, 
the French politics of the President fell into general disrepute 
and contempt, for men reasoned a fortiori, if such things be 
done in the green tree, what shall be done in the dr}'? It 
mattered not that Spain's highest official, the governor, dis- 
avowed the act, the fire was in the stubble. The intendant 
was stubborn and the fighting temper waxed hot. Both the 
governor and the Spanish envo}' at Washington disavowed 
the act again and rebuked the subordinate. Congress was 
soothed, but not so the people of the West and South. They 
were fully aware, as have been all our frontiersmen and 
pioneers from the beginning, that the Mississippi and all the 
lands it waters are the organic structure of unity and success- 
ful settlement on this continent. The Pacific and Atlantic 
coast strips, even the great but bleak valley of the St. Law- 
rence, are incidents of territorial unity and political control 
compared with the great alluvion of the Mississippi. This 
was unknown, utterly unknown, and, worse yet, entirely 
indifferent to our statesmen. Madison certainly, and possibly 
Jefferson, believed that western immigration would pause and 
end on the east bank of the Father of Waters. 

Yet party government was a necessity under our s^^stem, 
and Jefferson's ladder, the Republican party, would be knocked 
into its component parts should the West and South, noisy, 
exacting, and turbulent, desert and go over to the expiring 
faction of the Federalists; nay, worse, it might be forced into 
almost complete negation of its own existence by a forced 
adoption of the Federalist policy, alliance with Great Britain — 
monarchic and aristocratic — rather than with radical and dem- 
ocratic France. What could a distracted partisan do ? Jeffer- 
son was adroit and inventive. He sent James Monroe to 

H. Doc. 745, 58-2— vol 1 7 



98 AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION. 

negotiate with Bonaparte for the purchase of New Orleans 
and l)oth Floridas at the price of two millions, or upward to 
ten, for all or part, whatever he could get; he was not even 
to disdain the deposit or storage right, if nothing else could 
be had, and if he could get nothing, he was to await instruc- 
tions. With such credentials he sailed on March 8, 1803. 
A peace lover must sometimes speak low and small, even as 
cowards sometimes do. Three weeks later appeared in New 
Orleans Laussat, the advance agent of French occupation; 
Victor and his troops were to follow. It is not possible to 
conceive that a foreign policy should be more perplexing, 
confused, or uncertain than that of the philosophic theorist 
who is the hero of the strict constructionist party in these 
United States. 

Robert R. Livingston, the regular American envoy at Paris, 
had, under his instructions from home, worked with skill and 
zeal on the spoliation claims and incidentall}" on the question 
of the Mississippi and the Floridas. While the colonization 
schemes of Bonaparte seemed feasible, Livingston made no 
headway whatever, except to extort an admission that the 
spoliation claims were just. Neither Talleyrand nor Living- 
ston was much concerned about the great Northwest. The 
American was clear that the importance of any control lay in 
the possession of New Orleans, and on April 11, 1803, he said 
so to the French minister, vigorously and squarely declaring 
further that a persistent refusal of our request would unite 
us with Great Britain to the serious discomfiture of France in 
her colonial aspirations. This was said with some asperity, 
for Livingston had been aware that the First Consul wanted 
all negotiation transferred to Washington under the guid- 
ance of a special envoy sent for the purpose, the willful 
Bernadotte, and now worse yet, he himself was to, be super- 
seded by Monroe. He had been a diligent and even importu- 
nate negotiator; it was a ray of comfort in later days to 
recall that the first suggestion for the sale of all Louisiana 
was made to him in that momentous interview. 

What had occurred Livingston could not know. It was 
this: On the morning of that ver}^ da}' there reached the 
Tuilleries dispatches giving in full detail an account of the 
tremendous preparations making in England for the renewal 
of war both ])y land and sea. Bonaparte's impatience knew 



WOKLD ASPECTS OF LOUISIANA PURCHASE. 99 

no bounds. Hitherto he had concealed his true policy of sale 
behind a scheme to spend the purchase money on internal 
improvements in France, and he had on his work table map 
outlines for five great canals. Now, at daybreak he sum- 
moned Barbe-Marbois, sometime French consul-general in 
the United States, an official of state with a thorough knowl- 
edge of our aflairs, and ordered that a negotiation for the 
sale, not of the Floridas and New Orleans, but of all Louisi- 
ana, should immediately be opened with Livingston. He 
fixed the price at 50,000,000 francs. The envoy could of 
course do nothing, but he thought 30,000,000 enough. Next 
day Monroe ari'ived at Havre, and reaching Paris April 13, 
that very same day Barbe-Marbois and our two great states- 
men began to treat. Upon Monroe and Livingston devolved 
a momentous responsibility. Monroe was b}" a most indefi- 
nite implication left a certain libert}, for under no circum- 
stances whatsoever was he to end a negotiation if once it was 
begun. And here, instead of minimizing terms, was, so to 
speak, a great universe of land tender. But we had not so 
easily thrown off the bright and glistening garment of right- 
eousness as had Napoleon Bonaparte, and in the minds of both 
Americans was the question, nonexistent for the First Con- 
sul, as he himself squarely said, of whether the inhabitants of 
the district, men and women, human souls, could be dealt in 
as chattels are. 

Livingston had already seen darkly as in a glass what the 
west might make of the United States. Bonaparte's contri- 
butions to the discussion were terse and trenchant. If he did 
not transfer the title right speedily, a British fleet would take 
possession almost in a twinkling. The transfer, he said, 
might in three centuries make America the rival of Europe; 
why not? — it was a long way ahead — but, on the other hand, 
there never had been an enduring confederation, and this one 
in America was unlikely to begin the series; finally, he wanted 
the cash as the United States wanted the land. Let there be 
no delay. And there was none. The terms of the sale and 
the facts of the transfer do not concern us here. In Bona- 
parte we had no friend; but what the ancient regime began 
in establishing an American independence the First Consul 
completed; for, thanks to him, we fought the war of 1812 for 
commercial liberty, while the exploitation of Louisiana has 



100 AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION". 

made us what we are to-day. The instant we accepted that 
great territory, with all its responsibilities and possibilities, 
we became a world power. We were pun}- enough as a world 
power at first, but we have grown. Jefferson and his agents 
were primarih' statesmen for the purpose of existing- condi- 
tions, and in Monroe's mission desired a remed}- soleh* and 
entirel}" for party evils. They had, however, the courage to 
accejjt the fortune forced upon them, even though in their 
case, as in that of Bonaparte, it entailed, we repeat, a com- 
plete reversal of all the political and party principles of the 
platform on which they had hitherto stood. 

The change wrought b}^ the Louisiana purchase in Ameri- 
can life and culture was simpl}^ revolutionar3\ Hitherto in 
our weakness we had faced backward, varying between two 
ideas of European alliance. AVe virtually had British and 
French parties. Jefferson, who represented the latter, 
thought of no other alternative in his trouble than to strike 
hands with England. With Louisiana on our hands we 
turned our faces to our own front door. The Louisiana we 
bought had no Pacific outlet in reality, but the Lewis and 
Clark expedition g-ave it one, and that we have broadened by 
war and purchase until we control the western shore of the 
continent. Under such engrossing cares we ceased to think 
of either French or British ties, except as exasperating, and 
became not merely Americans, but, realizing Washington's 
aspirations, turned into real continentals, with a scorn of all 
entanglements whatever. In the occupation and settlement 
of Louisiana the slaver}- question became acute, and it was 
the struggle for the expansion of that system over Louisiana 
soil which precipitated the civil war. 

But if the change in national outlook was radical, that in 
constitutional attitude was even more so. The constitutions 
of our original States were the expression of political habits 
in a comnumity, the Federal Constitution was in the main a 
transcript of those elements which were common in some 
degree to all the British colonies. It was an age of written 
constitutions, because the flux of institutions was so rapid 
that men needed a mooring for the substantial gains they had 
made. The past was so recent that statesmen were timid, 
and they wanted their metes and l)ounds to l)e fixed by a 
monument. Nothing was more natural than to pause and fall 
back on the record thus made permanent, and strict construe- 



WORLD ASPECTS OF LOUISIANA PURCHASE. 101 

tion was and loiio- continued to be a political fetish. The 
Ijouisiana purchase was a circumstance of the first importance 
in party struggle. Yet neither Federalist nor Republican 
dared, after mature deliberation, to urge the question of con- 
stitutional amendment as essential to meet the crisis thus pre- 
cipitated. The enormous price entailed what was felt to be 
an intolerable burden of taxation, and in the uproar of spoken 
and printed debate pla^xd no small part. But the vital ({ues- 
tion was whether the adjustment of new relations was con- 
stitutional. 

Never did the kaleidoscope of politics display a more sur- 
prising' reversnl of effect. The loose-construction party lost 
its wits entirely, while the strict constructionists suddenly 
became the apostles not of verbal but of logical construction. 
Jefferson violated his princi])les in signing the treaty, l)ut he 
was easily persuaded that amendment was not necessary; that 
on the contrar\^ the treaty-making power covered the case 
completely. This was not conquest, which would have been 
covered b}' the war power, but purchase, which is covered by 
the treaty power, surrendered, like the other, by the States to 
the Federal Government. The Federalists were represented 
in the House by Gajdord Grisvvold; in the Senate bv Ross and 
Pickering. Their resistance was identical in both, factious 
to the highest degree. Thev contended that the Executive 
had usurped the powers of Congress b}' regulating commerce 
with foreign powers and b}- incorporating foreign soil and 
foreign people with the United States, this last being a power 
which it was doubtful whether Congress possessed. Suppos- 
ing, however, that New Orleans became American, how could 
a treaty be valid which gave preferential treatment to that 
single port in admitting French and Spanish ships on equal 
terms with those owned b}' Americans? The treaty, they 
asseverated, was therefore unconstitutional and, even worse, 
impolitic, because we were unfitted and did not desire to 
incorporate into our delicateh"-])alanced system peoples differ- 
ent in speech, faith, and customs from ourselves. The}" were, 
however, only mildly opposed to expansion; they were deter- 
mined and captious in the interpretation of the Constitution. 
The party in power were avowedly expansionist; their retort 
was equally dialectic and vapid. The whole discussion would 
have been empty except for Pickering's contention that there 
existed no power to incorporate foreign territory into the 



102 AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION. 

United States, as was stipulated by the treaty. The House 
had resolved, 90 to 25, to provide the money and had ap- 
pointed a committee on provisional government. The Senate 
ratified the treaty, 26 to 5. 

What made the debates and action of Congress epochal was 
the Federalist contention that Thomas Jefferson, as provis- 
ional and interim governor, was nothing more or less than an 
American despot in succession to a Spanish tyrant. Where 
was the Constitution now; where would it be when in appoint- 
ing the necessary officials — executive, judicial, and legisla- 
tive — he would usurp not merely Spanish despotism, but the 
powers of both the other branches of the Federal Government? 
The Republicans quibbled, too; to appoint these three classes 
of officials was not to exercise their powers. But they con- 
firmed in unanswerable logic a distinction thus far only mooted 
in our political histor3^ — that between States and Territories. 
Already presidential appointees were exercising all three 
powers in Mississippi and Indiana. This clenched the con- 
tentions of the Republicans, and the bill for provisional gov- 
ernment passed by an overwhelming vote on October 31. 
Both parties throughout the struggle had tacitly abandoned 
the position that Congress possessed merely delegated powers 
and nothing further except the ability to cai'ry them into effect. 
Both therefore admitted the possible interpretation of the 
Constitution under stress of necessity, and the Federalists in 
their quibbling contentions lost hold ever3'where except in 
New England. That section saw its influence eclipsed by the 
preponderance of southern and western power and ere long 
was ripe for secession. 

Volumes have been written and more will be on the romance 
of the Louisiana purchase. Josiah Quinc}^ threatened the 
dismemberment of the Union when the present State of 
Louisiana was admitted in 1812; but for Jefferson's wisdom 
in exploration it might have remained a wilderness long after 
settlement began; Great Britain coveted it in 1815 when 
Jackson saved it; Aaron Burr probably coveted an empire 
within it; Napoleon III had dreams of its return to the new 
France he was to found in Mexico. Excluding the Floridas, 
which Spain would not concede as a part of it, and the Oregon 
countr}^ the territory thus acquired was greater than that of 
Great Britain, Germany, France, Spain, Portugal, and Italy 



WORLD ASPECTS OF LOUISIANA PURCHASE. 103 

combined. Its agricultural and mineral resources were, 
humanly speaking, inexhaustible. No wonder it excited the 
cupidity as it stirred the imagination of mankind; no wonder 
if men avnd to retain their power were dismayed at the pre- 
ponderance it was sure to exert eventuall}' in a federal union 
of States. At the present moment fourteen of our Common- 
wealths, with a population of about sixteen millions and a tax- 
able wealth of seven billions, occup}' its soil. By the time we 
are fifty years older, at the present rate of settlement, these 
will contain about a third of the power in the Union as deter- 
mined by numbers and prosperity. All of them, however, 
were never more than administrative districts, and by the 
retroactive influence of this fact State sovereignty has thus 
been made an empty phrase. 

And this leads us to our final contention. If the Louisiana 
purchase revolutionized our national outlook, our constitu- 
tional attitude, and our sectional control, it has quite as radi- 
call}^ changed our national texture. From that hour to this 
we have called to the masses of Europe for help to develop 
the wilderness, and they have come l\y millions, until now the 
men and women of Revolutionary stock probably number less 
than fifteen millions in the entire country. These later Ameri- 
cans have, like the migrations of the Norsemen in central and 
southern Europe, proved so conservative in their Americanism 
that they outrun their predecessors in lo3^alty to its essentials. 
They made the Union as it now is, in a very high sense, and 
there is no question that in the throes of civil war it was their 
blood which flowed at least as freely as ours in defense of it. 
It is they who have kept us from developing on colonial lines 
and have made us a nation separate and apart. This it is 
which has prevented the powerful influence of Great Britain 
from inundating us, while simultaneously two English-speak- 
ing peoples have reacted one upon the other in their radical 
differences to keep aflame the zeal for exploration, beneficent 
occupation, and general exploitation of the globe in the inter- 
ests of a high civilization. The localities of the Union have 
been stimulated into such activities that manufactures and 
agriculture have run a mighty race; commerce alone lags, and 
no wonder, for Louisiana gave us a land world of our own, a 
home market more valuable than both the Indies or the con- 
tinental mass of the East. 



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